'Searchlight Serenade' on KEET

KEET-TV's latest documentary, "Searchlight Serenade: Big Bands in the WWII Japanese-American Incarceration Camps," premieres at 8 p.m. Tuesday on KEET-TV. The film combines interviews and animation to tell a little-known story about the swing bands that formed in the infamous American internment camps.

The film features first-person accounts of nine detainees -- big band trumpet players, saxophonists and singers -- who created a soulful escape for themselves and their fellow prisoners in that time of hardship. Their stories are interwoven with evocative animation created from woodcuts and drawings by Arcata artist Amy Uyeki.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were removed from their homes and forced to live in incarceration camps during World War II.

As families and individuals endeavored to create a sense of normalcy during their incarceration, many detainees engaged in artistic and athletic activities and some nurtured their love of music, especially the popular music of the day: swing.

"Searchlight Serenade" focuses on the proliferation of big bands in assembly centers and internment camps throughout the West during World War II. Nisei (second-generation Japanese Americans) quickly organized dance bands when they were evacuated to fairgrounds and racetracks that were converted into temporary assembly centers, and re-organized them once they were moved to the relocation centers in desolate areas of the country.

In all, 20 bands were created at 13 assembly centers and internment camps from 1942 to 1945. Swing music played a vital role as escape, therapy and as a connection to the outside world. Playing and appreciating this American art form was an aspect of their American identity that could not be denied within the confines of the camps or the denial of their civil rights.

KEET-TV producers Claire Reynolds and Sam Greene collaborated with Uyeki to tell the stories of former internees who played music in the camps through interviews and archival footage interspersed with segments of Uyeki's 12-minute animated short.

Created from woodblocks done in a traditional Japanese style, the animation is inspired by actual events and accounts as well as the personal experiences of Uyeki's parents, who were both interned with their families at Gila River and Minidoka Internment Camps.

Reynolds and Uyeki obtained substantial grant funding for the project, which allowed the production team to conduct interviews in Los Angeles, the Bay Area, Lone Pine, Yuba City and Portland. The Eureka PBS station is one of 24 organizations nationwide to receive 2011 funding from the National Park Service's Confinement Sites Preservation Program to preserve and interpret sites where Japanese Americans were confined during World War II. KEET-TV received $96,465 from the National Park Service and $22,000 from The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program. In addition, Uyeki received a Victor Jacoby Award from the Humboldt Area Foundation to support her animation.

The documentary will be screened as part of the Humboldt State University Campus Dialog on Race on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at HSU's Founders Hall, Room 118. It will air on KEET-HD on Tuesday at 8 p.m. and Friday (Nov. 2) at 9 p.m.

PBS stations nationwide will also have an opportunity to broadcast the documentary. On Nov. 9 the documentary will be offered free to PBS stations nationwide via a satellite uplink. DVDs will be available to public libraries, schools and the general public.

For more information, visit www.keet.org or call Reynolds at 445-0813.